Hearing aid devices can generally be divided into three categories: those that are located behind the ear (behind-the-ear models), those that fit primarily within the concha of the external ear (in-the-ear models), and those that are located almost totally within the ear's auditory canal (in-the-canal models). Typically hearing aids are composed of standard module hearing aids integrated into otoplastics derived from individual patient molds. The housings/face plates of hearing aids have openings for battery compartments, most often with a round, oval, square or rectangular cover (see for example U.S. Pat. No. #5,257,315).
Often, people who suffer from hearing loss feel a stigma attached to wearing a hearing aid. In some cases, this perceived stigma can keep hearing-impaired persons from wearing the devices necessary to correct their hearing loss, leaving them cut off from effective communication with the rest of society.
Despite the many recent advances in making increasingly smaller hearing aid devices, further design advancements, particularly relating to the color and shape of the devices, may help to make in-the-ear hearing aids even more invisible to the casual observer. For example, the present inventor is aware of no hearing aid design to-date that has taken into account the gradual changes in coloration or shading necessary to truly mimic the human ear as it appears to observers. The external ear (FIG. 1), called the pinna or auricle 10 is ovoid in shape and contains several structural features including the concha 12, a deep capacious cavity that leads into the auditory canal 14. Because of the various thicknesses of the ear structures and the shading caused by eminences or projections over the concha region, the interior of the external ear appears to be increasingly darker as one's eye approaches the auditory canal. The auditory canal itself may appear almost black, even in a light-skinned person. Monochromatic hearing aids are often colored to resemble the outer or helix 16 and antihelix 18 portions of the auricle 10 and do not mimic this natural shading effect. These hearing aids are thus more noticeable and call an observer's attention to the presence of a hearing aid.
There is a need therefore, for a hearing aid device that offers less contrast in appearance to the ear itself, and therefore, less visibility. Such a hearing aid, of whatever design or material, would make the hearing aid device less noticeable, and thus less of a stigma or embarrassment to the wearer. Furthermore, there is a need for a hearing aid in which all housing doors, such as a battery compartment door resemble the ovoid curves and shapes of the ear structures, rather than round or angular geometrical shapes that do not often occur in natural body structures.